For those influenced by European culture, the main dish (sometimes known as the entree in North America) [but not elsewhere]) is usually the most important dish of the most important meal of the day.
In a formal European-style meal, the entrée is the main or featured dish on the menu of a multi-course formal meal. The entrée is typically the most complex and substantial dish on the menu and usually includes meat or game with vegetable and starchy sides.
At a formal dinner, the above dishes act as a way of preparing and preparing the main course, which is considered the gastronomic apex of the meal. The following courses are intended to calm the stomach and the senses after the main event.
In restaurants, the main course is usually preceded by a light appetizer, soup or salad, and followed by a dessert or cheese plate. However, a structured formal meal can contain many more dishes than this. An example might be a fruit plate followed by soup, then a salad, a fish dish, the main course, a sorbet, then dessert, then a cheese plate, and finally coffee.
The spread meal was probably developed by the Etruscans and from there the practice traveled to Greece. However, it was the Romans who began to divide this prolonged culinary experience into separate dishes and it was they who first introduced the main course (the primae mensae in Latin) which was preceded by several starter recipes (taste) and followed by desserts (second).
The Romans introduced this method of dining to Gaul (now France) and by the Middle Ages it had become standard practice in French cuisine to divide formal meals into separate, successive courses. As French cooking methods permeated the courts of Europe, this formal dining system became the epitome of dining and forms the basis of our formal dining systems even today. It should be noted, however, that the entrance (literally entree) was the entree or appetizer at the French formal dinner and this is the sense in which this word is used everywhere except North America, even today.
Below is a Roman classic primae mensae recipe for:
Pork chops with sauce
Ingredients
750 g pork chops
100 ml of white wine
4 tablespoons liquamen (fish sauce, use Thai fish sauce)
4 tablespoons of water or broth
4 tablespoons of cider vinegar
4 tablespoons of olive oil
Method:
Heat a skillet, add a little oil and cook the pork chops until almost done. Set the chops aside and wipe out the pan.
Add the rest of the ingredients to the clean skillet and place the chops in the liquid. Bring this to a boil and continue cooking the chops, turning occasionally, until done. Arrange the chops on a plate and cover with the sauce.
Serve with steamed leeks and fried pumpkin.